Click to viewNow that Paramount and Dreamworks Animation have just announced they will exclusively support the HD DVD format, we thought it was time to revisit the current status of studio support for both Blu-ray and HD DVD. At last check, Blu-ray had all but a few studios locked down in their camp, with HD DVD trailing far behind. Has it changed?

Every time I feel ready to declare Blu-ray a winner by technical knock-out, HD DVD fights…
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Blu-ray

HD DVD

Columbia Pictures(1), MGM (1,3)

Yes

No

Disney

Yes

No

Dreamworks (4)

No

Yes

HBO

Yes

Yes

First Look Studios

No

Yes

Fox (3)

Yes

No

Image Entertainment

Yes

Yes

Lionsgate

Yes

No

Magnolia Pictures

Yes

Yes

New Line Cinema

Yes

Yes

Paramount (2)

No

Yes

Porn Studios (7)

No (except for Vivid)

Yes

Studio Canal

Yes

Yes

Universal Studios (5)

No

Yes

Warner Bros. (6)

Yes

Yes

The Weinstein Company/Dimension

No

Yes

So at our count, Blu-ray has eight studios actively supporting (taking out the two that haven't released a Blu-ray title in months), and HD DVD has 12. So HD DVD actually has more studio support at this point if you factor in the porn studios and smaller studios like HBO and First Look Studios. If you remove these two and add back in Fox and MGM (assuming they'll some day release some more titles on Blu-ray), the two formats are dead even at 10 a piece.

This is definitely a change in the previous common knowledge that Blu-ray had more studios' support. With the addition of Paramount and Dreamworks, HD DVD has more or less tied up the game in terms of what movies are available on what formats. And that, not which format has the better technical specs, is what's important to consumers in the end.

Update: Fox just called and told us that they're going to be continuing (re-continuing) their support for Blu-ray in the future.

Update 2: MGM just announced that they're also continuing support for the Blu-ray format.

Footnotes:

1. Both studios are owned by Sony

2. Includes Paramount Vintage, Nickelodeon Movies, MTV Films.

3. Stopped releasing Blu-ray movies, haven't released a disc for a few months and has no announced title plans. (Update: Fox just called and told us they're continuing their Blu-ra support) (Update 2: MGM just did the same)